A movie review of ​MARJORIE PRIME.

Seen at the Sundance Film Festival: London 2017. (For more information, click here.)

“I have all the time in the world,” Walter Prime (Jon Hamm)

While watching the story unfold, the feeling that this might have been better as a play was confirmed when the end credits rolled. The source was indeed the theatre. Confined spaces can work well in cinema, from 12 ANGRY MEN to BURIED, but the filmmakers must be firing on all cylinders, continually varying dynamics to hold the attention. Unfortunately, MARJORIE PRIME’s stilted dialogue and narrative gimmick leaves one unsatisfied. Maybe on a rainy afternoon and this movie comes on the television, then give it a whirl.

Director Michael Almereyda is not a blockbuster helmer sell-out. His oeuvre is ambitious. ANOTHER GIRL ANOTHER PLANET (1992) and AT SUNDANCE (1995) were shot on a Fisher-Price toy camera. Almereyda’s last, EXPERIMENTER (2015), is a compelling biopic of social psychologist Stanley Milgram (played by Peter Sarsgaard). It is thus disappointing MARJORIE PRIME did not grab. EXPERIMENTER could also have been a play, but is a different beast. It does not help that the tone here is surreal and melancholy, as if a bedtime story is being read to us.

​MARJORIE PRIME is concerned with big topics. On one level, the story is about how technology might ease the grieving process. Marjorie (Lois Smith), through cutting edge hard/software, is conversing with her deceased husband, Walter (Jon Hamm), at his prime. This is the version she prefers. At first, before the explanation, we wonder whether Walter is a figment of her imagination, or an angel, or a ghost.

Like Spike Jonze’s HER, but not in the same league, humanity’s bonding with artificial intelligence is examined. TERMINATOR/MATRIX robo-pocalypse is not envisioned, rather a benign companionship. MARJORIE PRIME and HER allow us to witness a machine’s humanity being shaped. Here, issues unable to be broached by the real person are given a second chance: Catharsis at saying what could not be articulated. A different kind of therapy. At the time, we may not have had the words or the understanding. The loved one might not have been able to hear it. Emotional intelligence hopefully continually evolves.

Hindsight and objectivity are also examined. As the characters look back on events, are they really accurately remembered? Memories are not filing cabinets, suggests a character. There is a single flashback, so we have to rely on what the players opine. We should care about these people by the end, the way we care about our family/friends when they converse with us. And that is the major problem with MARJORIE PRIME, it is the charismatic thespians (Geena Davis, Tim Robbins included) who engage, not the material.​

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